It is so important that as we get older, we don’t confuse the transition from romantic love to companionate love for boredom or friendship.I’ve witnessed it countless times. People who never see it coming are suddenly standing there all alone, clueless as to what could’ve happened.There’s no telling what happens to make someone realize they’ve “fallen out of love.” There seems to be no real rhyme or reason most of the time as to why people just stop feeling the same, freak out, and abandon the relationship. 

They always say if you’re going to bail, bail early. I completely agree with that statement. But as humans who thrive on relationships with other people, we can’t bail on everything. We have to weigh our decisions – figure out what’s worth sticking around for. 

Someone you love? Well, I would hope that warrants a little more consideration than most decisions. The ability to maintain love over time is the hallmark of maturity. Many people regard love as something that just happens to them, much like catching a cold. What we don’t often realize at our tender, wild age of twenty-what-have-you, is that love is the ultimate commitment. You have to choose to wake up every day and love someone, over and over and over again. Falling in love, STAYING in love, doesn’t happen on its own. Love requires our time, effort, patience, understanding and unwavering dedication. 

Being in a relationship is not only a commitment to being monogamous, it’s a commitment to continually build on and improve the quality of your relationship. Most long-term relationships that end do so not because the couple, “fell out of love,” but because, somewhere down the line, they stopped working together on their relationship. Or in many cases, one partner has simply forgotten that love grows and evolves and begins to mistake the relationship for nothing more than a friendship. This can be detrimental. Leaving someone that you truly care about behind because you mistook her for nothing more than a friend guarantees you a heap of regret later on in life. 

I beg of you, friends, stop. Stop abandoning your relationships because you, “just don’t feel the same anymore.” Well of course you don’t! The same person you’ve seen every day for the past two years probably doesn’t make your heart want to explode with an entire hoard of zoo animals. You definitely are more reluctant to get up at 7am for cute breakfast dates. I highly doubt you put those heels on and your hair up the way you did every day last year trying to catch his attention. 

The fact of the matter is that love changes. We change. It is silly to expect our feelings to remain at a constant state when so much time has passed and intimacy has grown. It’s hard to not feel like maybe you’re falling out of love when you catch the eye of a cute stranger and find that he/she makes your heart race a little bit. And what are we supposed to make of it when we find ourselves enjoying an intellectual conversation with a member of the opposite sex? These things don’t mean that you’ve lost the connection and romantic feelings for your current partner; it means you’re human. 

Do not focus on the completely normal connections you’re making with others and how they could develop if you were single, but rather on how you can improve the connection you already have with the one you’ve worked so hard to be with. The kind of love that lasts forever is more than feelings of passion, infatuation, obsessiveness and love-sickness. That kind of love is addicting and exciting, but it comes with a sense of anxiety and a front row seat on the roller coaster of emotions. You may be mistaking something for true love when it is really nothing more than mania (look that one up): a series of extreme highs and soul-crushing lows. Someone’s ability to make you utterly miserable in a way that no one else knows how does not make them your soul mate.

Few feelings are as exciting or joyous as romantic love. Heck, that’s why we’re so obsessed with talking about it, watching movies about it, listening to songs about it, and ultimately, finding it. Unfortunately, passion of such intensity fades after time. If the relationship is going to continue, romantic love will develop into companionate love. This is not to say that you won’t still experience romance with your partner, not by any means. This simply means that your feelings of love evolve into a deeper affection and attachment. This is perhaps why couples who experience this type of love often refer to their partner as their best friend. You become much closer to your significant other in this stage of love, whereas in romantic love, you both tend to be more concerned about your own needs rather than the needs of your partner. 

I’ll leave you with this: think about your relationship role models. What do they act like? Most will say they are best friends. They do things for each other, they have fun together, and they enjoy spending time together even when they’re doing nothing. They’ve had their fair share of hard times, but they’ve chosen to stay together. There is no shame in occasionally feeling bored out of your mind while sitting inside with your boyfriend on a Friday night. Heck, this is eventually what that hot and heavy hookup you could be having right now will turn into anyway (if he doesn’t break your heart first). Love only gets old if you let it, and I guarantee if you stop paying your relationship the attention that it needs, it will fall apart accordingly to no one’s fault but your own.